First non-school flight!

Last week I received an anonymous COD letter. I had to pay a little more than SEK 4500 to get it out. But as I fairly well knew what the contents of that letter would be, i gladly put up that money.

And yes, it really was my pilot license. At last. More than one year after my initial flight. And most of the time has been spent waiting for different things. First the student permit, then a new aircraft, then vacations and then for the final paperwork. And I had to wait even more before I could start flying. We had a small trip planned for the weekend, so I had to wait until today before I could make my first private flight.

Unfortunately the weather wasn't too good today. Cloud base at less than 2000 feet, 9 km visibility and some crosswinds. And it seems like it's becoming worse the next few days. But anyway, today was mostly a practice flight. I flew to Stegeborg, made a couple of turns in various directions and returned for a total of eight landings (no, I didn't bounce, they were separate landings).
The flying went better than expected, and it felt really good to be out on my own.

I have summarized the costs for my flying lessons, in case someone is curious:

Ground class admission fee: 2750 SEK
Literature: 680 SEK
Flying club membership: 1105 SEK
Medical examinations: 2000 SEK
Student permit: 666 SEK
Various maps and other stuff from KSAB: 1760 SEK
Flying lessons: 9600 SEK
Issue of license: 850 SEK
Fuel costs for travels between Linköping and Norrköping: 3000 SEK

This adds up to 22400 SEK. However bear in mind that I have previously had a glider pilot license, taken some PPL lessons and do some simulator flying at work. This has probably reduced the needed number of flying lessons. But on the other hand, that is perhaps compensated by the costs for my travels between Linköping and Norrköping and that my medical exams got extra expensive because of my eye problems. However, in any case, I would say that this is an extremely affordable way of flying.